Friday, April 04, 2014

Americans: Dumb and proud of it

It seems the Christian right has its panties in a knot
because Neil deGrasse Tyson, the host of the rebooted Cosmos series, won’t include creationism in his show. His SCIENCE
show. Yes, I’m shaking my head too, but it’s true. In 21st century
America, we have a substantial portion of the population that cannot
distinguish between science and superstition.

Treating creationism seriously in Cosmos would be like including unicorns in a documentary about
animals. As a clever writer in Salon pointed
out, why not cover other more interesting creation myths like the ancient Greek
or Egyptian versions? We all know the bible story backwards and forewords.

You know your country is in trouble when your House
Committee on Science, Space and Technology is packed with climate change
deniers, Luddites and creationists. The confounding thing is that Christian
fundamentalists seem to relish their ignorance. Just watch five minutes of Pat
Robertson’s 700 Club if you don’t
believe me. We don’t need to be smart or even make sense. We’ve got Jesus.

We (American voters) have to take some of the blame for this
as we continue sending imbeciles like Michele Bachmann, Darrell Issa and Steve
King back to Washington. Maybe we should have a national intelligence
requirement (IQ over 70?) for voting. Seems like we need to do something before
we dumb ourselves down to the point of extinction.